One Step Away From...

It is the eve before our departure (Mystery Tour #3, Canadian border crossing attempt #2), and ready, or not, here we go. The engine hums like never before, the stores are aboard, and the Glory B has a new coat of paint and varnish to mark the occasion. Computer behavior: acceptabe. Am I caught up on my work? Ah, no. But the nice thing about working from home is that your work is always at hand.

The two things I was going to do before the next phase of our adventure began, was to make my last Alaska report from my "Walk Alaska" tour I went on this spring, and to finish up the voting campaign for whether, or not, Stella Madison should be allowed to travel along with us, this summer. Which (I am sorry to admit) is entirely out of my hands, now, as she has taken off ahead of us. 

She crossed over the border during caper #3, with the publication of Sea Trials. I'm hoping we meet up with her and her crew before we get to Alaska, but I'm done making promises. Mostly because it's embarrassing when you can't keep them. Now, I know the meaning of that scripture that tells you to put "if God wills" on the end of all your promises to others. Not because we don't always know what He is going to do, but because we are rather unprepared for what our own reactions will be when something goes amiss and He has to get us out of the soup, with a switch to plan B. Our choice, not His, but He is ever-faithful. 

Praise the Lord--He always has things covered (He knows the future, and that's a huge advantage). Our part of this faith venture seems to be in trusting Him that "our steps are ordered," and He has orchestrated all the details beforehand. It takes a great weight of worry off, actually, as there are no worries when you remember to let Him do the driving. Now, there you have the lessons of our last two years in a nutshell, and...

We are are officially off at dawn tomorrow morning. High tide is then, which we need to get out of this bay we have spent the winter in. At the moment, my goal is to update this blog once a week (if God wills), and more if we are somewhere to get Internet. When we cross back into the U.S. near Ketchikan, Alaska, I will then be able to use my hotspot, and communications will be pretty much back to normal, again. We are aiming for the first week in July...

If God wills!

Lost in the Swamps...

It has been a long time since I visited my own blog. Sad but true. Not because I don't absolutely love sharing my adventures with readers, but because I have run into a series of obstacles lately that pretty much got the better of me. One was yet another computer crash (we've all had those, so no need to explain) and the other was a broken foot. Also sad but true.

I wish I could say it happened on some exciting adventure, but I was only going to meet a friend at a local restaurant and missed a step. I don't know where that step came from. Except to say I didn't see it for the same reason I don't drive: little to no depth perception. Over the years I have learned tricks to distinguish such things as a bug flying in front of my glasses from a bird passing in the near distance. I also try to hang on to something, or somebody, when moving through strange places.

I have even learned to ignore most of the audacious things I see, because they are usually not true. Like the time I saw a full-grown hog on a freeway that had been dead so long all four legs were sticking up in the air. It wasn't until we passed by that I learned it was only an oddly shaped strip of rubber that had torn free from an eighteen wheeler. Things like that. I am also easily distracted, and have been known to miss some very important things, entirely.

At any rate, languishing away in the depths of despond aboard the Glory B for the last five weeks has been a real wake-up call for me. I am incredibly out of shape! The Lord has been trying to nudge me about this, but my response was always, “I'll get to that, just as soon as I finish all this work I'm behind on.” I know now that I am behind because I'm out of shape. I mean, how can one expect to “run the race to get the prize” if they can't even qualify to enter?

Not to mention hopping around on one foot (when you haven't done that since grade school), or having to be hauled up to the car in a dock cart if you need to go somewhere is highly embarrassing. Which is why it has now become my number one priority to get in shape and take this entire adventure more seriously. Especially if the Captain should ever need me to haul on some line, or jump onto an approaching dock in a hurry. Things that happen in the boating world all the time.

Anyway, I have finally found my way out of this mess I've made and finally able to hobble around enough to pick up where I left off. Which is to finish up with my Alaska reports, and get Stella Madison back on the “campaign trail” to see if she will be coming along when we set off on our 2014 Mystery Tour, the first week in June. She has taken off ahead of us with the publication of Sea Trials (Caper #3). Which—since she is coming from California-- will still coincide with our own departure from the San Juan Islands.

But more about all that, next time.